Special Olympics Iowa
Minutes of the Board of Directors Meeting
Monday, February 15, 2016 5:30 p.m., Grimes, Iowa
Board Members present: Steve Palmer (Chair), Jill Southworth (Vice Chair), Neil Berns (Secretary),
Kathy Lively, Charity Hodson, Lana Voga, Ted Oberlander, Deb Eldred, Stu Sorrel, Keith
Board Members present via conference call: None
Board Members not present: Brian Wessels (Treasurer), John Richardson, Joe Ramirez, Keith Saunders,
Michael Lightbody, Lynn Clayton, Dr. Mary Stevens, Jill VanDerPol, Joanne Whitmore
Meeting Recap
1. Welcome
Steve welcomed everyone, and announced that John Richardson has resigned from the board. Do
not need to accept John’s resignation, but will need to elect a new Secretary. Lana Voga nominated
Neil Berns, and Kathy Lively seconded. Board unanimously approved nomination.
2. Athlete Update
Kathy Irving let us know that Charity Hodson will be giving a speech at the capital for “Spread the
Word to End the Word”. Charity then proceeded to give her speech for the capital to the board
members and employees. Charity opened up to the group about her experiences with the word in
her choir classes growing up, and how it made her feel.
Charity also shared her experience with the Torch Run Dance, and how much fun she had.
Charity applied for a job at the YMCA, and they are currently checking her references. She is anxious
to receive an offer that will allow her to watch children two days a week.
3. Acceptance of Prior Meeting Minutes
Steve asked for additions or deletions to the minutes. Jill Southworth motioned to approve minutes
from the prior meeting, seconded by Lana Voga, and approved by unanimous consent.
4. Introduction of New Staff Members
Gary introduced new employees. John Kliegl, new VP of Development, previously worked with Best
Buddies. John explained his path towards SOIA. John talked about the inclusion that his daughter
would when she was growing up, due to work of organizations like Special Olympics. He explained
that his whole goal and focus is to build inclusion on a greater scale for individuals with special
needs, and reemphasized his commitment to be a consistent employee for SOIA.
Gary also introduced Jordan Allen, the new manager of Volunteer and Unified Sports, who joined us
in September. Jordan previously worked with Dance Marathon, and discussed her path to Special
Olympics. She and Gary recently attended a conference in Phoenix on Unified Sports and she
expressed that she is excited to be a part of the team.
5. CEO Update
Gary provided a 2015 Year End Review. He explained that the team has done an outstanding job of
meeting expectations. Some accomplishments include:
a. Beat the $43,000 shortfall in the budget.
b. Helped to gain the confidence in our constituents, and he feels that SOIA is on the way to
getting this done.
c. Athlete growth and recruitment: grew when we expected to be level.
d. Athlete experience – re-launched equestrian and mini golf, were represented at world
games.
i. Reviewed opportunity to increase gymnastics. Volunteer brought 4 athletes out to
train for winter Olympics from Gigi’ playhouse at Chows gym. Plan is to return to
Gigi’s playhouse to recruit their participation in summer games as well. Discussed
the grass roots efforts of recruiting, and John explained that the grass roots effort is
a good way to grow the athlete base.
e. We stepped up athlete recognition this year. Worked with channel 5 to achieve a weekly,
full year commitment when it was originally scheduled to only be 3 months. Tyler Steinke
will be on Wednesday.
f. We did 12 days of athletes, Casey’s cups, athlete trading cards, unified relay across America
and Cory Leonard carried the torch into Dodger stadium at World Games. We also had the
largest global messenger pool this year.
g. Volunteer management and growth is improving and we are looking for a better way to
track and recognize our volunteers as this has not been done in the past. We grew
volunteers in 2015.
h. We have added Lincoln Savings Bank as a Premier Partner.
i. Won make my non-profit run better contest, and will bring Peyton Manning to town to
recognize our athletes as partnership with Des Moines Register.
j. Taking it to the streets has helped build stabilization with constituents.
k. Created a coaches advisory committee this year, and they meet once/month on conference
calls and four times annually in person. Rebuilt our coach’s guide this year, which is very
comprehensive.
l. We have a new IT system and website.
m. Had 100% staff giving this year.
n. Utilize new accounting subaccounts to help track spending. Building better HR processes.
Added event driven numbers to statistical tracking.
o. Congratulations to the SOIA team on a job well done this year.
Development Update: We have several grants and proposals to send out this month. Stu Steffy
has picked up a lot of the grant work along with one of the interns. We have a Granite City
fundraiser this Wednesday. Mid-winter tournament – still need some funds. Summer Games
has their first committee meeting this week. Gary referenced the endowment funds. SOIA has
hired a new database coordinator. Gary highlighted that Cop on Top and that LETR raised over
$900k for SOIA last year and they continue to volunteer as well. Gary requested that we
support them as well.
6. Departmental Updates
John Arnold – Highlighted the efforts that Sally Briggs has made to capture information sooner, and
have higher confidence and understanding of the information. Also working with regional directors
to help us capture information. Overall number of athletes has grown, and we have narrowed the
gender gap. There is a challenge with getting an accurate count of the number of volunteers due to
the fact that often volunteers just show up, especially law enforcement.
Trend in winter games looks like numbers are declining. However, snowshoeing makes up most of
decline, largely due to Iowa City schools no longer participating and passing that along to Iowa City
parks and recreation. John sees ice skating as an opportunity to grow.
Spread the word was highlighted on March 1st. John would like to coordinate our board retreat with
this event. Encouraged board to review dates and find opportunities to volunteer. Asked that you
contact John or Jordan to let them know which events you will participate in so they can find ways
to highlight your participation due to membership on the board. He encouraged the board to
search Facebook for all the delegations in Iowa to really get a feel for what is going on.
Kathy Irving highlighted the Global Messenger workshop, and that they trained 19 global
messengers, when we have never done more than 9 in the past. She highlighted Ted Oberlander’s
participation in the event, and how she has helped to make it better (Thank You).
Jeremiah Johnson gave a financial update for board. Focused on the new high level report and 2015
budget to actual. Beat plan by $3,000. Key variances include:
a. $60,000 more on corporate vs. a shortfall in grant which offset each other. Due to a
misclassification.
b. Promotion revenue was largely driven by Price Chopper /golf outing/OTE/Plane Pull all being
down.
c. Took a loss on the Lindbergh trust ($17,000). Gary recommends that we work to get the
trust moved to the Centralized account, but would that would result in roughly $250,000
expense if we did this, and lower the value of sate account (versus centralized account).
i. Motion by Ted Oberlander to move to central account and adjust to 2015 with
approval of auditors. Motion was seconded by Jill Southworth, and passed with
unanimous vote.
d. Program payroll offset by Admin payroll
e. IDMP – Source we use for calling/online soliciting. Final numbers from them came in well
below where they had been estimated, and we are working with them to better understand
the difference.
f. There were question on finances from development in kind
January Budget Update
- We had budget a loss of $128,000 and the actual loss was $179,000. $10,000 was due to
markets being down in January, contributions being down $10,000, $10,000 OTE
unbudgeted deposited, torch run tee-shirts unbudgeted. Revenue was down $30,000 and
expenses were up $20,000.
- Jill VanDerPol motioned to approve financials, Stu Sorrell seconded, and financials were
unanimously approved.
7. Board Expectations
Request that we all sign annual conflict of interest on Board of Directors (attached). Steve
highlighted two key areas:
a. Statement 7, regarding personal contributions to SOIA. There were two members of board
in 2015 that did not contribute SOIA, which does not allow us to respond that we have 100%
board participation.
b. Statement 8, which highlights volunteering at 3 events per year, including Summer Games.
8. Board Member Election
Special Olympics have lost 4 board members in December, and there are two individuals who could
join the board immediately. Currently we are at 17 board members. Board spent time reviewing
and discussing the resumes of Jack Ohle and Colonel Ken Rizer.
a. Kathy Lively motioned to appoint Ken Rizer to the board, was seconded by Keith Saunders,
and unanimously approved.
b. Neil Berns motioned to appoint Jack Ohle to the board, was seconded by Stu Sorrell, and
unanimously approved.
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Get details of new committee members: Lana reminded us that we need to have a majority
of board members on the committee. Question around whether or not staff counts in the
equation to meet the half requirement. Feel like historically we did not include the staff in
the measurement of 50%.
There was also a suggestion to add a fundraising committee. This was followed by a
recommendation to add the fundraising committee as a working committee. The decision
was made to consider committee approvals at the board retreat.
Keith Saunders asked about the maximum number board members allowed, which is 25.
We are currently at 19. Keith suggested we look for opportunities to add new members.
Gary suggested adding someone from Hy-Vee due to John Richardson’s resignation, and
suggested that Brad Waller may be a good fit. Discussion around bringing on Brad as a
replacement board member or fulltime appointment. Ted recommended a review our
board governance/skills grid to determine if we need anything in particular. Gary suggested
he determine Brad’s interest level, and we have an online vote. Kathy mentioned that we
may be missing a medical representative. The board was comfortable with the electronic
voting approach. Another desired skillset would be educators. The board also approved
discussing board membership with Pam Yochum and Don Pearson from Wells Fargo. Keith
Saunders will follow-up with Pam, and Gary will follow-up with Don.
9. New Business
- Kim Lively will be the female athlete of the year in the Big 12, and will attend the Big 12
championships, and will get the same championship ring as the winning team.
- Spread the word: Board members show up at 9 or 9:15. More details to follow for the day.
10. Closed Session
Neil Berns motioned to go into closed session and Kathy Lively seconded. The board went into
closed session.
Lana Voga motioned to come out of closed session and Jill VanDerPol seconded. Motion to come
out of closed session was unanimously approved.
11. Adjournment
Kathy Lively motioned to adjourn the February board meeting, Jill Southworth seconded and the
board approved by unanimous consent.